WOYWW 206

It's What's On Your Workdesk Wednesday again.  For details, please see Ms. Julia's page.

My back appears to be getting better and I have started scaling back the codeine this week, although I took a double dose at lunchtime by accident (should have been a single dose) and spent the subsequent three hours effectively stoned.  I got a lot of work done, administered first aid and dealt with two complaints (not about me), so I don't think anyone notice.  Need to be more careful.

My desk this week:

To the left, don't know if I've mentioned this one before, but it's a cross stitch pattern a dear friend gave me for Christmas just gone.  It's called 'Cat Pile' and is a heavily Photoshopped picture of a number of different kinds of cat.  I don't think my friend read the specs, or more likely didn't know what she should look for as this pattern is 15 x A4 pages and after I converted the colours from Anchor to DMC, discovered it has 107 colours in it.  Yes, that's 107.  I feel it would be rude of me not to give it a go a she is a good friend and she did spend money on it.  Just don't expect it to be done anytime soon.  I envisage it as the background piece I pick up between projects.

Dan bout me two big Caramel bars, half of one has already been snaffled.

I started a felt bird tutorial on Sunday, which explains the green felt clippings and scissors.  The bird is roughly in the centre of the shot, near a small pile of stuffing.  It is terribly small and very fiddly, so I may make up a load for Chrimble prezzies

Nathan's Diatom cross stitch is still going, at the back of the shot.  I mentioned last week I was taking it on holiday with me to Mudeford to fill in some of the blackwork.  That went well for the first two days of the holiday, when I was in control of my embroidery skeins.  At the end of day two, I found my niece posting the black down a gap in the sun patio of the lodge we were staying at.  Thus ensued a quiet search for a Haberdashery to buy another one.  Ha ha ha - Haberdashery?  What's one of those then?  I obviously take the fact that I work in one for granted, because it seems that no one else has one.  We went to the one I'd heard of in Christchurch, but it had closed down.  I spotted a Bradbeers in New Milton as we drove through the town and made a mental note to stop on the way back and investigate it.  Plans were changed and I never got there, so I packed it away and got my book out instead.  Want a new and exciting book to read?  Get 'The One Hundred Year Old Man Who Climbed Out The Window and Disappeared by Jonas Jonasson out of your local library - it's the bomb! (snigger)

Work have just bought in a load of Decopatch stuff in and it's payday tomorrow and I wonder whether I have the will power to resist.  I will buy the tissue box at some point because I like giving useful gifts.

That's enough words.  See you next week:))) xxx

WOYWW 185

Well all i can say is, it's a good job i'm not walking in to work this morning, because I wouldn't have had time to write this!

My desk today (well, 6am.)

I am so tired, I just tried to post this picture as a link.  Doh!  These are my Parliament of Tupenny owls that i found in a book called Microcrafts from the library.  They are called 'tupenny owls', because after the first one I made came out to lightweight and floaty, I stuffed the rest of the owls with a two pence piece each to give them some weight.   A great use for fabric scraps.  I've just speed wrapped all 24 owls into trios and gave them all a name (In this shot, we see Octavia, Orla and Odysseus).  I'm giving them to some of the part timers at work and to a couple of friends I know would appreciate them. They have a large length of 3mm black grosgrain ribbon by which to tie them to things and decorate an area with.  I love owls.

The mystery tins get revealed a week today!  The reason why I've opted for a comfy bus ride this morning over a 3 1/2 hour walk in the cold and dark, is so that I can transport all the mystery tins to my colleagues.  It also means, and this was not planned at all, that I will be able to swing by Nero's for something nice to drink before starting work.  I am looking forward to a complete day off tomorrow (NO INFERNAL ALARM CLOCK!) so I can put my playroom back together and take stock of what presents are going where in the upcoming days.

See you all next week for the big reveal (So as not to give the game away for Fairy Thoughts)!

Go and check the other WOYWW desks here.
xxx

WOYWW 184

Hello, and welcome again to another What's On Your Workdesk Wednesday, where you can hop about to your heart's content checking out other people's projects and spaces.  All hosted by the lovely Julia, and can be found here.

To all those who commented on my blog last week, that is indeed a hula hoop behind my desk.  I got it for my birthday this year.  It comes out from time to time and is great fun, but after about 100 hulas, i seem to forget how to hula (or I've noticed a bee flying past the window, or similar) and it falls to the ground.  Meanwhile, it stays behind my desk so i don't forget about it.

This week, I have cleared everything off my desk and have begun making my Christmas cards (finally!).

Here, we have 15 white cards that I cut yesterday, 15 mini cross stitches of various designs that i stitched last March and a pack of removable double sided tape.

After they've been done this evening (and signed and enveloped), I shall be cracking on with wrapping the rest of my family's presents.

Coming up:  More work on the mysterious tins, paper chain-making, Christmas shopping and wrapping gifts for Dan's family and plotting new cross stitch designs for the new year.  Yee haw!

I hope you all have a fantastic week and check out the other blogs over at Stamping Ground.

xxx

***Blog candy alert!***

Candelle Creations have put together this amazing stash of cardmaking goods for you to win.  Go and have a look at their blog to see how you can get involved.  Draw ends Jan. 9th.  Good luck! x

WOYWW 183

Wednesday again and another WOYWW!  Click on this link to see a whole raft of creative desks:)

Here's my desk...

Not tidy this week!  Right then.  We have handmade Christmas gift tags in top left corner, tub of wallpaper paste, tissue paper, ribbon and button embellishments for, Oh what are they at the back of the table, Fairy Thoughts2?!  I feel the mystery is unravelling:)

At the front of the desk are the cross stitch decorations I have been making for the charity do my other half is putting on in aid of Child's Play.  The characters are:  Poison mushroom, two life hearts, star, Piranha plant, Sonic, Tails, Knuckles, Mario, Green mushroom and two space invaders.

The plastic envelope package is my other good deed for Christmas this year.  I'm part of a Random Act of Kindness (or RAK) group on Swapbot and i was recently invited to a swap called Sending Christmas Cheer For a L'il Girl.  The girl in question is seven year old Lilly, who suffers with Guillain-Barre syndrome, or ascending paralysis that starts in the limbs and migrates to the torso.  She is very poorly so i am sending her two colouring in books with pencils and a Christmas card after a conversation with her Grandma over what would be an appropriate gift.  While she can still use her hands, I am told, she loves to colour things in.  If you'd like to join in and send Lilly a Christmas card (gifts are optional), you can get her address here.  Check on your country's last Christmas postage dates to the US (where she lives) first to avoid disappointment.  For the UK, it's Monday 10th December.

The charity do is this Friday, so normal Christmas decorations etc will resume thereafter.

Have a lovely week everyone and see you next week!

WOYWW ~#3

Hello all! This will be my third (or fourth?) attempt to get my desk on WOYWW with much help and despairing from Janet at Fairythoughts. I may well have cracked it.

This week on my desk, I am starting a new project, which is why it all looks neat and a little laid-out. I'm not going to say what it is I am making as they are going to be presents for some of my friends and I know that they look here sometimes. Best not to give the game away, I say.

The item will comprise of a tin can, electrical tape, tissue paper, wallpaper paste and the plastic tube innards from the inside of till rolls I've been saving at work since about March. I like to recycle.

So, tonight I will be seeing if I can knock one of these together. Tomorrow is my day off and I am hoping to be able to find the time to start getting my homemade wrapping paper together. I still need to find the cross stitch motifs I made earlier this year as they are going on Christmas cards. Then, more decorations and stockings to be made, AND WRAPPING EVERYTHING!

Have a look at the other WOYWW desk at Stamping Ground

See you next week!

xxx  

WOYWW? #2

Do you know what?  I may have actually taken a picture, written some words and posted it all up in the right place this week!

I've been determined to get on with making Xmas decorations for my new house, but have been struggling with inspiration of late.  The red discs toward the back of the shot were inspired by my colleague, Janet (Fairy Thoughts).  She is holding a Christmas craft workshop at work this Saturday and had course info leaflets printed out which showed a picture of Xmas decs she'd made, so i used the round design and sewed anything that came to hand on them (yarn, buttons, safety pins, beads, ribbon, etc).  I've attached ribbons to them and am hoping they make their way onto the as yet, non-existent Christmas tree.

Next to all that is a template for the two Christmas stockings I'm making for my partner Dan and I.  I got the fabric from work.  It's thicker than cotton, but not as rough as sacking/hessian and has a delightful print of Santa and Rudolph on it.  See -

I'm going to line the stockings (for no real reason, other than extra work for myself) with the spotty multi-coloured fabric seen in this picture.  I'm hoping to give them drawstring openings but shall see about that when i'm a bit further down the track.

Other things to do this week include: Cutting stock card into Christmas cards, figuring out what I've done with all the Christmas themed cross stitches i did earlier this year that are meant to go on the aforementioned cards, cut gift tags out of old birthday cards, potato print brown paper for  gift wrap and wrap the presents bought so far.  Fun times!

Go and have a look at the other blogs that Julia stamping-ground has signed up while i get on with this mountain of craft!

Take the skinheads bowling, take them bowling.

Has it really been so long since my last post?!  I have spend most of this last month being ill part time.  I get a sore throat, headache and always one blocked nostril, then it plays out over the course of a week in a different way each time.  Just as i notice its getting better, two days later the sore throat comes back.  Odd.  So i'm just starting my fourth cold in two months it seems.  I wonder if it has anything to do with taking up swimming on a daily basis for that very same amount of time. Hmm.

My memory is shot and i can't remember half of what has happened in the last month, so i'll start now and work backwards.  I am listening to Camper Van Beethoven after hearing Take The Skin Heads Bowling on 6Music this morning over my Porridge.  I'd never heard the original before so it was a bit of an eyeopener.  I can't decided whether their version or the Manics version is better cos they differ quite a bit.  There is more fire and vigor in the Manics version but i quite like the slower laid back version of the original.  I shall Wiki them in a mo to see who they are.

I just got back from the cinema where i saw 2012.  I shan't put spoilers here but i say it was worth it.  Epic destruction via a morbid amount of CGI on a scale that i have never seen before on film.  Don't listen to James King's 1 star out of 5.  Plotline is not great and the fact that it is two and a half hours long meant i started to get bored in the last half hour, but the film was well proportioned with no rush at the end.  There is love, chaos, land problems, heartbreaking moments, more good people die than the bad ones and at least two people get their comeupance.  Ok.  ONE SPOILER (sort of)  Woody Harrelson is a ledgend.  I salute the man for his supurb acting and the suprise of not knowing he was in it.  I shall IMDB to find the errors.  There must be thousands.  So go and see it :)

The Bear left for his first foray into Cornwall this afternoon.  He's gone to see the Rose nursery down there and meet the folk who run it, who he will hopefully be the boss of come June time.  He'll be working in the field too, lifting roses all day.  It's the first time in 6 years that we have been apart.  We see each other every day.  I went to the cinema so i would mope about the house.  It's only for 3 days though, so not too bad.  Still miss him though.  Spicy cat is offering me her warmth and purrs which is lovely.  It is still a nice novelty to have her sleep in the bedroom with me.  I look forward to seeing Bear again on Wednesday.

I've had quite a few bag sales and unfortunately what looks like a non sale by someone from Russia cos they can't read the payment terms.  Dumbass.  I have sent five bags to a shop in Philidelphia which scouted me out on Etsy.com for my recycled shopping bags.  That was exciting.  I've now got to send her a small profile of myself and what i try to do and some pics so she can put them on the website too.  She only wants a 30% cut too.  I've just had a week of and i've really gone to town helping morsbags.com.  They are an online non-profit organisation that calls on the sewing skills of women to give their free time to make fabric shopping bags to give away in towns and cities guerilla style.  We intend to encourage people to stop using plastic bags which are slowly throttling our animals and environment.  I am in the Winchester City Baggers pod on Morsbags.com and am currently recruiting.  I am taking fabric and supplies donations and monetary donations to pay for the labels to go on the bags.  The people who make the bags do it all for free.  I've made 12 bags so far and i've still got two days left of my holiday to go.

I GOT TICKETS TO SEE CHARLOTTE HATHERLEY AT THE RAILWAY INN!
I want to get Muse tickets for the Wembley gig next September when they go on sale next Friday, but i quake at what the cost will be.

I can't remember anything else.  Oh, i choked on the fizzy shit on a Tangfastic. In the cinema.  At a really quiet part of the film.  Goon.